I took a vacation. After embracing my path and making a major career switch by leaving my full time 7:30-3 and fully committing my being to Naturi Beauty, I decided it was time to take a break. After all working a full-time job while building a multi-billion dollar empire is no easy task and while the transition was a fulfilling one, by the time I looked up from my to-do list for the summer, my body decided it could no longer keep up with my mind and hence demanded that I vacate.
Vacate. It’s what a lot of us do when things get a little Crazy. #noticethecapitalC. Unmaneagable. Rough. Monotonous. We’ll find ourselves dancing to a tune of shoulda, woulda, coulda’s if we’re not careful, especially if we decide that vacating is more safe than being in the moment.

So vacate I did, but I didn’t leave my body, emotions, nor thoughts….I left my space. Currently I’m in DC getting ready to embrace the streets with a bunch of Bacchanal for the Caribbean Carnival. I’ve spent my nights with entertainment and lots of body sensory rich activities. I think, I know the energetic exchanges and dances at the salsa club reawakened a part of me that I vacated for awhile all in the name of entrepreneurship. #sonotforgettingthatagain…Mmmm what a night!
During my days, I take self-guided tours, particularly of the mean culinary scene that DC has to offer. Whether I simply gaze at menus, drool at displays, taste when my belly allows or strike up conversations on the Metro #causeIdothat, I find myself in a beautiful, awakened state of beingness.
I do like it here, because admittedly, I do forget what it’s like to be what Geneen Roth, in Women, Food and God calls a state of “inquiry”. That place where we are hyper aware of what’s going on physically, the sensations we feel, the aromas we smell, the sights we see, the textures we feel without any mental attachment to them, just experiencing the essence of the essence and continuing life as if we’re 2 and not 29, trying our best to get it all figured out before 30.
So yeah. My vacation has brought me to the most familiar place of all. Me. That’s right. Nothing unfamiliar but yet completely new. Next to my time in Brazil, this is probably one of the coolest trips ever. While the salsa dancing, carnival jump up, belly enticing eye candy, Cuban musical enjoying, people meeting are all really cool….I think I dig this time of inquiry and I’ll make sure that I don’t treat her like a souveneir, tossed in the luggage, brought home for a temporary ooh and aaah and never to be discovered again until the #i’mmovingclosetcleanout. Nope. Not her. She’s too dope. Way too special. And super necessary for the evolution that is me. In those times when I forget…..because trust me I do forget during my healthy dosages of life fastballs that I try to catch with no gloves…#ouch…yeah in those moments…I’ll have inquiry. I’ll have this summer in D.C. I’ll have Me.